


New Years

by retro_tinlizzy



Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Blow Jobs, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Smut, Getting Together, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Multi, Nervousness, Oral Sex, Public Blow Jobs, Rape/Non-con Elements, Self-Harm, almost getting caught, sex in war, tragic gays
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-06
Updated: 2021-01-22
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:35:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23517799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/retro_tinlizzy/pseuds/retro_tinlizzy
Summary: This wasn’t expected to be a good year.  Not when everyone was thousands of miles away from home and suffering in the extremes.  Father Mulcahy knew that he was no different from the members of the Lord’s flock that he was supposed to be shepherding.  And this New Years party taking place in the officer’s club of the M*A*S*H 4077 wasn’t making him feel any better about his damnation.
Relationships: Father Francis Mulcahy/Benjamin Franklin "Hawkeye" Pierce, Father Francis Mulcahy/Doctor Sidney Freedman, Father Francis Mulcahy/Original Male Character(s)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 18





	1. Chapter 1

This wasn’t expected to be a good year. Not when everyone was thousands of miles away from home and suffering in the extremes. Father Mulcahy knew that he was no different from the members of the Lord’s flock that he was supposed to be shepherding. And this New Years party taking place in the officer’s club of the M*A*S*H 4077 wasn’t making him feel any better about his damnation.  
Francis found himself lusting after people in his life. Some of them were the regular doctors who he knew were promiscuous enough to lie on his cot and take his cock. There had been many temptations in the entire time he had been in Korea, along with the many advances that had come. No matter whether he had his collar on or not - no matter whether he had visibly been a priest or not - there had been young men who offered to drop to their knees and drop their pants.  
“Are you enjoying the festivities, Father?” Hawkeye asked from the nearby door of the officer’s club.  
The chaplain could see the smudged lipstick on the very edge of the surgeon’s collar. He absent mindedly touched the top of his turtle neck, pulling it up over a hickey that only existed in his mind.  
“I am not having the best evening, Hawk, but any day we can recognize the grace of God is a good day.”  
Francis swiveled his stool away from the piano and took a sip from his glass. The dew drops clung to his hand as the watered down liquor still managed to burn his throat. The chaplain had forgotten what exactly had been poured into his glass. He took another sip and then asked Hawk, “Have you been having a good evening with the fairer sex?”  
“Which one is the fairer sex?” Hawk laughed as he picked his own glass off the edge of the piano. “If you weren’t so chaste, Padre, which of the fairer sexes would you be interested in?”  
Francis downed his entire glass of watery liquid before he even allowed himself to start thinking about the answer to that question. If Hawkeye could be so publicly present with his fluid sexual preferences, couldn’t he let his own preferences be apparent? Just for a moment to let people know that he was a human being too.  
“I don’t think now is the time or the place to answer that question, Hawk. I wouldn’t want you coming on to me,” the chaplain answered as he tossed the glass around in his hand.  
“If I buy you another drink, would you be interested in answering my question? Or would I have to buy you something else?”  
“Doctor Pierce, as nice as your offer is…”  
As Francis trailed off, Hawkeye leaned against the piano and leaned even further in towards the chaplain.  
“I won’t tell God if you won’t.”  
“God isn’t the problem Hawkeye. It’s the fact that you’re willing to have sex with a man who is a decade older than you who you have confessed your sins too.”  
The chaplain got off of his swiveling piano stool and stepped away to the bar. He couldn’t take making eye contact with Hawkeye for a second more.   
“Do you want another, Father Mulcahy?”  
Klinger was standing behind the bar in a shimmering silver dress. It would be appropriate for anyone attending at party at the residence of Jay Gatsby but felt a bit out of place for the bartender.   
“I don’t want to seem like a common drunk, Klinger, but what did I have last time?”  
“You had the government’s piss poor excuse for whiskey.”  
The cross dresser dropped a blurry ice cube into the chaplain’s glass, following it up with a heavy pour of whiskey. Francis couldn’t help but think back to the days of his youth in Philadelphia. He was poor. His family had always been poor. But at least as Irishmen they knew how to get their hands on a good bottle of whiskey.  
“Well Klinger if anyone had dared to serve this as ‘whiskey’ in Philadelphia, they would have been locked up for fraud.”  
“Oh, is that so?” the shimmering waitress remarked as they leaned their hairy arms on the bar, smoking their usual cigar.  
Francis played with the glass in his hand once again. He looked over his shoulder at Hawkeye. The surgeon was still leaning against his piano, giving the chaplain his regular smart ass looks. If Francis were younger and this was a different war, he would have fucked the young surgeon in a minute. But now he was living in the 1950s instead of the 1940s, and it was finally the time for him to be respectable.  
Everyone else already thought he was respectable.  
“It most definitely is so, Klinger.”  
Someone else had already answered for Francis. He turned on his bar stool to see who it was and found that it was Doctor Freedman. Somehow the priest had managed to forget that the visiting psychiatrist had dropped by for the New Years festivities.   
Francis remained silent while studying Sidney. His eyes were wandering to below the belt of the man seated next to him and he barely thought about the consequences of his actions.  
In response to Francis’s wandering eyes, Sidney noted, “You look like you’re reflecting on something important, Father. Do you care to share with your bartending psychiatrist or the proper Jewish psychiatrist?”  
“As long as you function under the same confidentiality agreements as I do, Doctor Freedman.”  
“You already know the privacy agreements that come along with my profession, Father.”  
Sidney laughed as answered Francis, with his hand slipping onto the chaplain’s thigh. They barely looked at each other while his hand rested in that fairly innocent position. If it had been Hawk’s hand on his thigh, Francis suspected that the young surgeon would have already been on his knees and insisting on pulling his pants down.  
With a smirk and a slight laugh he asked, “I can keep a secret if you can, Doctor.”  
At first, Francis thought he was missing something or putting too much in his cues. As Sidney pushed his hand further along his though he could feel the blood trying to rush into his underwear. The chaplain stirred the ice cube around with his finger, both hating and enjoying the cold at the same time. It was nice to have the reminder of home and have his ice cube hold shape for more than a minute, but it was doing murder for everything below the belt.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Like the bold men always said in the movies, it was a shame for Sidney to leave but it was lovely to watch him go. Francis could not get the image of the those tight stretched trousers out of his mind as he nursed on his watery whiskey. He had been away from the glass for so long that he had forgotten about his initial complaints, simply swallowing the light amber mixture while thinking about what else was going to be swallowed that night.

Francis kept his silence while he kept Sidney’s hand on his knee. He decided that he would finish his drink before making any further advances - out of respect for himself and for the psychiatrist’s sake as well.   
Klinger came back over to where they were sitting. They started to open their mouth and then saw the psychiatrist’s hand on the chaplain’s knee. The bartender picked up their scrub rag, going down to the end of the bar and striking up a conversation will Colonel Potter. Francis couldn’t hear them until Potter commented, “Klinger, that’s a wonderful gown for the new year. Reminds me of something Mildred wore to a party back in 1923.”  
The crossdresser’s reply wasn’t audible to Francis. He looked around their little bar at the multitude of people gathered in their own groups. Hawkeye had thankfully moved on to flirting with a corpsman who was eagerly sucking on the surgeon’s neck. It almost felt embarrassing for the other queers in the room - particularly how none of them would be so blatant with displays of affection. If he did end up in the situation of being able to kiss Sidney, it would be done privately versus flaunting themselves in a public barroom.  
“Francis, would you like to get out of here?”  
To start with, the chaplain was surprised that Sidney even remembered his first name. Sometimes the doctors would use his first name to try to taunt him. Other times he would hear the nurses fumble over which name to use, with the routine complaint about Catholics.   
“Hmm?”   
“Well you just looked like you were on an entirely different planet and I thought you might need a change in scenery,” the psychiatrist trailed off while taking a sip of his own mysterious drink.  
With anything served in the officers club, Francis was surprised when there wasn’t a cockroach floating in the cocktails.  
Francis knew he was making a mistake as he picked up Sidney’s hand, intertwining their fingers and then said, “Which tent would you rather go to, yours or mine?”  
“I’ll collect a couple of things from my tent to get clean and then come see you in about an hour.”  
The psychiatrist set his glass down with a sharp thud, his hand moving from Francis’s thigh to his shoulder. He bent down to quietly whisper, “Or do you need more time to prepare than that?”  
“Do you have the necessary supplies to be on the bottom bunk?”  
“I never leave home without them,” Sidney said and clapped Francis on the back. He pulled back from the whisper to say publicly to the crowd of the officer’s club, “Have a good night and a happy new year, Father.”  
Like the bold men always said in the movies, it was a shame for Sidney to leave but it was lovely to watch him go. Francis could not get the image of the those tight stretched trousers out of his mind as he nursed on his watery whiskey. He had been away from the glass for so long that he had forgotten about his initial complaints, simply swallowing the light amber mixture while thinking about what else was going to be swallowed that night.   
The chaplain’s eyes stayed glued to the dingy bar counter in front of him but he could hear all of the sounds of the party happening around him. There was a thanks to God as he could hear even the sounds of Klinger’s beads banging combined with the click-clack of knockoff designer heels. All these hints came before the lovable bartender asked in a sly voice, “So, Father, have your evening plans changed at all?”  
“After the conversation Doctor Freedman and I just had, yes. Yes, I think my evening is about to get much nicer, Maxwell.”  
Francis could see the smile hiding behind Klinger’s cigar and he couldn’t help but wonder about who the corporal spent his nights with. The chaplain was much too old to have relations with Klinger. He also thought, and it was just a guess, that he was the wrong gender for Klinger. He had been involved with some studying in Germany before the war, gaining such knowledge that always led him to believe that Corporal Maxwell Klinger was more than just a crossdresser. Maxine might have been a more appropriate name with the following assumption that the bartender definitely preferred Janes.  
“I’m glad your night is getting better, Father. Everyone deserves to have a nice time after suffering through this party all night long.”  
Their polite chit chat went on for a few more minutes. He managed to excuse himself from the bar when Klinger became distracted by another customer. The conversation was laden with innuendos that Francis tried not to put too much thought into as he finally walked back to his tent. A few people greeted him on his trip back, some of them being in between different tents with their garments around different parts of their bodies. There was so much shock on their faces as they realized what their local priest had seen and everyone rushed away with flushed cheeks when they realized his presence in the courtyard.  
Maybe if Francis hadn’t already had an appointment for this evening he might have tried to convince someone in the Swamp to let him join in in their activities. For a long time, once the frisky visitors had left, Francis simply stood in the yard looking at the moon and going through the checklist in his head over what he needed to do for the activities on the schedule.  
His walk back home only took a few more minutes and he fumbled with the latch for a few seconds before remembering it wasn’t a proper door. Once this problem was solved he quickly stripped off his clothes down to his boxers, standing in front of the mirror while wondering if the shorts should come down as well. The shorts stayed on while he put on a thinner silk robe, slicked back his hair, and began mentally preparing himself for the next part of the night.  
“You can do this, Fra-”  
There was a sudden knock on the wooden frame of his shabby tent door.   
“Francis, are you decent?” The visitor asked.  
Francis untied the knot on his bathrobe, letting it hang loosely off his shoulders. He turned his back on the door then called out, “I’m indecent and the door is unlocked.”


	3. Chapter 3

The Father remained in front of his mirror, surveying the profile of the disheveled psychiatrist standing in his doorway. Sidney’s hat was barely staying atop his head with a slight tear on the side that wasn’t placed there earlier in the evening. The damage to his clothing matched the scratches and cuts that Francis could spot before his dear doctor rolled his sleeves back down. Clearly something had happened between their flirtations in the bar beyond Sidney preparing himself to be penetrated. At least Francis hoped the man had understood that part of the message.  
Without turning around, Francis asked, “Whatever did you do to yourself in the short time I didn’t have my eyes on you?”  
“I’m sorry, Francis. I got a bit nervous waiting for our meeting after I had finished,” the psychiatrist paused and gulped. “After I had finished preparing myself for you so it would be smooth sailing.”  
Francis turned away from his mirror and his careful grooming to guide Sidney onto his cot. He sat the man down and took the seat beside the sweating psychiatrist. While the priest reached for the bottle of whiskey his sister had sent him for Christmas, he kept one hand on Sidney’s thigh. He was worried for a moment that Sidney had changed his mind - that it was a slip up because he was drunk - and that now some wonderful, beautiful man had self harmed just because he was nervous about saying no.  
“If you don’t want to do this, Sidney, I can understand a few kisses being the result of a drunken stupor. Plenty of closeted homosexuals have made that excuse in the past when I was simply too enchanting for them.”  
This was the moment when they were either going to part forever or they were about the enter the most exciting affair of their life. Francis couldn’t stand to look at the man anymore for fear of the outline of his cock showing against his sheer-ish robe. He grabbed two mismatched glasses from the top of his standing closet, pushing against his glasses with the back of his knuckles, and made his way slowly back to the bed. Sidney had slumped forward, little droplets of blood dribbling down the sleeves of his white uniform shirt. Evidently the cuts that the priest had seen at the beginning of the evening had caused more harm than either of them thought, and Francis quickly rushed to the bedside. He laid his poor (hopefully soon to be) lover out on the bed, quickly unbuttoning the stained shirt as Sidney slurred, “I didn’t realize you were so anxious to get into my pants, Daddy. Or is that not an appropriate thing to call you in place of ‘Father’?”  
“I want to laugh at you and I want to laugh with you, but I am more concerned about you bleeding out all over my cot,” Francis hurriedly explained as he tore strips off the bottom of a tent floor t-shirt to stop the flow of blood.  
“Do you really care that much about me, my dear Francis?”  
The priest leaned down over him, kissing his forehead and whispered, “I do care about you. More than you know but I also care about the state of my furniture.”  
Francis felt compelled to add in his usual line of wit as he came to term with the situation around him. He rushed to find a clean pair of boxer shorts to disguise the package underneath his Japanese robe before quickly marching over to the Swamp to explain the situation. Even with all of the confusion running through his head, he knew that he couldn’t report this directly to Colonel Potter or risk the end of Sidney’s prestigious career.  
“Is anyone in there?” The priest asked after taking a few quick strikes on the rickety window. He stamped back and forth in place, fully aware that the robe was no longer covering his shoulders, and that any passerby could see their priest in the almost nude. The last time Francis had that sort of attention was when he was young in Philadelphia during the summer when he ran out to the street market to buy soda water for his ailing sister.   
_No one is going to be coming tonight, Francis,_ he thought to himself. _Not even you are going to come tonight, you stupid fag._  
Right as he was starting to walk away, a blond haired, neatly mustached face popped out of the tent and the voice that addressed him called the priest back.  
“Father! What can I do for you?”  
“Oh uh there’s been a little incident in my tent with someone attempting to cut their arms.”  
The half, joking smile on BJ’s face quickly changed to one of shock and terror. Francis watched the man as he grabbed his own bathrobe, collected up the medicine bag from beside his bunk, and rushed ahead of the priest to the tent with the injured man. The nervous priest had to walk slowly behind the excellent surgeon to avoid all of the feelings coursing through his body. Some of it was guilt. Some of it was just the simple shock and simple pain of seeing another person he loved fade away into nothingness.  
“Father! Father, are you coming to your tent?”  
Francis looked up to see the doctor’s hand on his shoulder and he simply followed along quietly. When he reached the door of his tent, Francis hung against the loosely planted beam while he watched BJ stitch up the wounds on Sidney’s arms. The psychiatrist was still out of it in the moment but clearly writhing with pain for each time the needle pierced his skin.  
“Is he going to be okay, Doctor?”  
“Sid-he is going to be just fine. How exactly did this happen, Father?”  
“He simply came to see me to talk and as I was getting out a drink for us to discuss over I noticed the blood on his hands,” Francis paused as his voice started to crack, and then he continued, “And the next thing I knew he was nearly unconscious and I rushed over to the Swamp.”  
BJ was clearly looking between Francis and Sidney all neatly laid out on his bed in dressings. Oddly enough, Francis felt more calm around the rigidly heterosexual BJ than he did around the absolute fairy that was Hawkeye Pierce. He followed the doctor’s eyes around the room as he realized the man must have spotted the open drawer of silky drawers or the tub of lubricant or maybe even the foot trunk that contained some of the items Francis had picked up on his last holiday to Germany.  
Before the doctor could explore too far, the priest quickly asked, “Are you going to tell anyone else about this, BJ?”  
The doctor was packing up his black bag as he calmly stated, “I was just here in your tent to help you with a lost soul who came to confess his sins after harming himself. We are both working on the same confidentiality here, Father.”  
A slip of paper and a bottle of pills went into Francis’ hands as he stood in shock looking over his dear love. BJ walked out of the tent with a simple good bye that the priest barely noticed. Without a second thought, he re-locked his door and laid down beside Sidney to protect him from whatever harm might come their way next.


	4. Chapter 4

Francis woke up before his bedmate, still gently holding Sidney in his arms, and wondering how much of last night had actually happened. His night was supposed to end with wonderful sex with a beautiful man but instead it left him worried about the mental and physical state of a good friend. Waking up on New Year’s Day without a hangover was a change from his past decade of celebrating the passing of another hopeless year. With Sidney’s head in his lap, the priest began formulating the outline for his daily mass that would have maybe three attendees. Then it would be his time to make rounds in the hospital or help hold a bottle of saline for the rattled medical staff. He was proud of his ability to serve in so many ways while wondering why he even had to be in Korea in the first place.  
“Are you awake yet, Sidney?” he asked while gently nudging at the sleeping psychiatrist. Francis waited a few moments for a response before slowly slipping out from under the warm mass, stopping to wrap Sidney up further in his blankets. The father slipped on his own flannel robe, collected his toiletries, the worn out slippers, and an equally worn out dirty magazine from his youth. He rarely had a reason to look at the ‘sinful’ material but his feelings from last night had not yet subsided. His situation certainly hadn’t been helped by Sidney laying between his legs all night long and their hips occasionally clashing as they tried to find the most comfortable positions. It all led to points of conversion that left Francis desperate for an orgasm before he had to put on his collar and resume helping other people.  
While fixing his slightly bent eyeglasses, Francis repeated to himself, “You can do this. You can make it through the war. You can make it through another day with Hawkeye Pierce. It’s only one more day, Francis.”  
Luckily, once he stepped outside of his dim tent, the Lord had blessed him with a peaceful walk to the showers at the mid hours of the morning. He supposed that on a normal day the hour between 9 and 10 might not be the busiest but he was still confident in the amount of privacy available today. Though it seemed that his privacy was quickly slipping away as the image of Hawkeye Pierce stood by the distant men’s showers. Francis pushed the tattered magazine further into his robe pocket with the silent wish that he had something to cover it up further with.  
“Father Mulcahy!” Hawkeye shouted from the distance with an arm out in the air and his robe hanging half open. Francis could only be thankful that this time the doctor was clothed beneath the robe and not entirely naked like the first occasion when advances had been made. “How are you doing this morning, sir?”  
Francis took the length between the opposing doctor to decide on his answer. He wasn’t exactly sure how he was feeling this morning and part of his reasoning was encouraging him to take Pierce up on his advances. It would be so easy to go that route but the Father knew how dirty it would make him feel afterwards, whether or not Hawkeye sucked him clean. He moved his towel to his other shoulder as he came face to face with, the admittedly very handsome, Hawkeye Pierce.  
“I’m doing quite well this morning, Hawkeye. How did your early morning activities go in the officer’s club after I took my leave?”  
Hawkeye smirked as he looked back at him, bringing a martini glass out of thin air as he returned Francis’ question with another one.  
“I thought you might have been engaged in some early morning activities of your own with the way that Sidney was looking at you all night long.”  
“And I think that you might be quite mistaken about what you can and cannot assume about my life, Doctor Pierce. Must I remind you again that no matter my sexuality, I am a Roman Catholic priest with a vow of celibacy and partnered only to God.”  
His concern for Sidney was the only thing that kept Francis from assuming his boxer’s stance. He pushed his way past Hawkeye into the showers, slamming the door behind him with a dramatic intent.  
“Now Father, why did you have to bring all of that attention to our quiet little conversation?”  
Hawkeye clearly did not take the closed door as a sign to let go of the priest’s emotional well being. He knew that the doctor was not very good at reading symbolic actions but surely a closed door would stop most normal people. The lack of normalcy in Pierce’s personality is what allowed Francis the confidence to comment, “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that a closed door wasn’t enough to stop you. I’ve heard from more than a few nurses over my time in this camp that you aren’t very familiar with the word ‘no’.”  
The priest opened the shower door with his boxers still on, not wanting to take any risks, even though he knew which position Pierce preferred in bed. Or at least he thought he knew from all of the rumors that he had heard. He took his robe off slowly, draping it over the shower door with the pocket away from Pierce’s looming eyes. Taking off his boxers only took a second more and Francis said another quiet prayer that there would be enough hot water to outlast the uncomfortable conversation.  
“I’ve listened to you when you said no but then again you do have a certain amount of power over me. Your muscles from being a boxer are almost intoxicating to a fellow sportsman.”  
Mulcahy rubbed his bar of soap between his palms while trying to interpret all that had just been said to him. He knew that on a certain level that Hawkeye would not harm him but he was a bit unnerved by the thought of someone being ‘intoxicated’ by his muscles. “Am I even that muscular?” he wondered to himself while soaping up his dirty blond - well quickly graying hair. If Francis was going to have such casual shower thoughts he might as well be honest with himself about the entire state of his body.  
When he finally decided on an appropriate answer for the looming doctor, he looked up to find that Hawkeye was no longer there. He wiped the soap from his face once more to make sure that no one was present in his many blind spots when he was without his glasses. A moment more of looking around revealed that his dirty magazine had been taken out of his robe pocket and placed on the bench without a mention. He quickly stuffed the literature into his pocket without another thought, resuming the peaceful bliss of his shower before he had to emerge from the shower tent to the frozen world of the M*A*S*H 4077. The frozen world outside and the diminishing hot water were quickly colliding to force Francis back into his clothing and suppressing his lower half’s needs.  
“Father?” A different voice was calling for him along with the creating door to the shower tent. Francis turned off the tap, deciding he had had enough of a shower, and proceeded to fumble for his glasses. Every time after he showered, he thought about how he should really put his glasses in a designated place. And every time by the time he went to shower again he had forgotten his well thought out strategy for locating his glasses in the post shower haze.  
“Are you looking for these?” A rather gruff voice asked as a hand collided with Mulcahy’s own and pressed his glasses into his hand.  
“Yes, yes those were what I was looking for.”  
He left out a thank you until his vision had focused enough to see who had handed him the spectacles. The image of Klinger came out of the steam and Francis quickly reached for his robe to hide the ever growing presence of his nether regions. His mixed attraction to Klinger had been the result of a previous one off incident when their paths had first started crossing. Klinger was far less aggressive than the other queers at the 4077 and in fact he might be the exact opposite of aggressive.  
“Did you come in here for a particular reason, Klinger? Or just to stand here in the steam while I am in the near nude?”  
“I came here to collect you for Colonel Potter. He has some concerns about the stability of the orphanage and would like me to take you to go see the Sisters.”  
Mulcahy stepped out of the swinging shower door, rubbing his hair with his towel, and thinking over the words that had just been said to him. The order of events when it came to Klinger and Colonel Potter never made much sense to him, but perhaps he should be thankful that he wasn’t regular army. He walked out the door with Klinger trailing behind him and he hadn’t even noticed the masculine attire of the corporal until now. Halfway back to his tent, Francis stopped Klinger in his path to ask, “Klinger, why aren’t you wearing a dress today?”


	5. Chapter 5

“Well sir, I’m trying it as a bit of a New Year’s resolution. You know I uh decided to switch up my wardrobe a bit and try to get out of the army in another way.”  
Father Mulcahy always had a certain amount of admiration for Klinger’s devotion to leaving the army. If only the chaplain could get away with dressing up in women’s clothing, putting on makeup, and imaging himself as a transsexual. While they might not throw Klinger out for that, they were certainly throw Francis out of every service for such an action and might put him to the firing squad as well. Back in the folds of Philadelphia, Francis had become acquainted with different transsexuals and ‘queens’ that put on ever so lovely shows. He could rarely go to them with the constraints in his schedule once entering the priesthood but the parlors and theaters had been a wonderful escape during his teenage years.   
“Well Klinger, it seems like an even more daring attempt for you to wear men’s clothing than it is for you to wear women’s clothing. Though to the best of my recollection, you were in the mood of wearing colored handkerchiefs when you first arrived at this camp.”  
The chaplain and the clerk exchanged a quick series of glances at this remark just as they arrived outside of his tent. Francis nodded to Klinger before he slipped inside to check on Sidney and dress himself for the meeting with Potter. He was relieved to find that his dear psychiatrist was still lying in his bed, bundled up to his neck in the sleeping bag, and was now wearing one of the chaplain’s crisp, black turtlenecks. Sidney must have woken up while he was in the shower and helped himself to chaplain’s wardrobe. He ran his fingers through the psychiatrist’s hair, sitting down on the edge of his cot, then leaning in closely to softly leave a kiss on his lover’s forehead. Just as he was pulling away to rearrange his collar, Sidney woke again with a stir to say, “I hope you don’t me borrowing your shirt - mine was just a bit bloody from last night.”  
“I know, Sidney. You really had me worried last night when you showed up like that.”  
Sidney sat up and slid out of the bean bag, pulling at the tight sleeves of the turtle neck. He pushed and rolled one of them up to the point of his elbow to examine the bandages and the accompanying stitching beneath them.   
“Did…did you do this or did you have someone else come to save me?”  
“I don’t know enough about medicine to bring someone back from the point of bleeding out. And you should know enough about medicine to not cut yourself in places that would cause you to bleed out,” Francis criticized as he cupped Sidney’s chin in his hand. He knew that he was being harsh, but Francis found it hard to deal with the fact that Sidney might have attempted such a thing because of him. There were certainly a lot of obstacles and challenges between them to be able to have a healthy relationship. Francis couldn’t help think about the short lived dalliances of his past where partners cared only for his sexual ability. Those experiences had brought him brief euphoria followed by decades of shame.  
“I didn’t hurt myself because of you, my love. If you ever want to see the rest of my body, after the pain I put you through, then you’ll find out how long I’ve been doing this.”  
All the chaplain could do was nod in agreement. He looked out at the shadow of Klinger still standing in front of the tent door. Klinger was one of the few people in this camp that Francis could trust to overhear bits and details of a person’s life and recognize when it was okay to share such details with others. The corporal was a known gossiper, but he was also a dear friend who could respect the boundaries the chaplain had created.  
“Of course I still want you. Why wouldn’t I want to have you?”  
“Because of the pain-”  
“The only pain that I’m worried about, Sidney, is whatever pain you’re in now. I’m going to send BJ back over here to give you something more while I’m on my way to Colonel Potter’s office.”  
Francis reached out to stroke Sidney’s hair once more before he stood up and straightened his hat. He thought he was nearly ready to go out the door but remembered just in the nick of time that he still had not found a suitable pair of trousers. Granted, there were only seven possible choices in his closet, with four of them being the same grim, deep black color. It was still a hard choice to make when he woke up from his solitary life every morning and had long been his inside joke to assure himself that he was certainly a queer.  
Sidney reached his hand out as Francis was adjusting his pants and boxers in front of the hanging mirror, begging the chaplain to stay with soft, happy eyes. He could see the psychiatrist’s lips parting slightly, like he was planning on protesting BJ coming once again. But then Francis could see the man start to shiver as the pain set back in.  
“Are you ready to go yet, Father?”  
Klinger banged on the tent door as a reminder but didn’t attempt to pull it open.   
“I’ll be along in just a moment, my son. I was simply counseling a troubled soul,” Francis announced for all of those in the surrounding area to hear. It just felt like a necessary measure after having a mysterious man in his tent all night long.  
He opened his door to join Klinger in the frigid temperatures, suddenly feeling like a terrible person for making the corporal stand outside for this entire time.  
“Klinger?”  
“Yes Father.”  
“Do you mind if we stop over at the Swamp on the way to the Colonel’s office?”


End file.
